1. Technical Field
Various embodiments relate to a semiconductor apparatus, and more particularly, to a circuit for stabilizing an internal voltage.
2. Related Art
A semiconductor apparatus converts a voltage supplied from outside into an internal voltage Vint according to a level required inside the semiconductor apparatus, and supplies the internal voltage Vint to an internal circuit. Depending on requirements of the respective regions of the semiconductor apparatus, a core voltage Vcore, a bulk bias Vbb, a pumping voltage Vpp and the like are used. In order to generate the internal voltages using the voltage supplied form outside, corresponding internal voltage generation circuits exist.
FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a conventional semiconductor apparatus using an internal voltage generation circuit 10.
The semiconductor apparatus includes the internal voltage generation circuit 10 and an internal circuit 20 configured to receive the internal voltage Vint and perform a predetermined operation.
The internal voltage generation circuit 10 includes a driver 15 configured to generate the internal voltage Vint from an external voltage and a capacitor C1 configured to stabilize the internal voltage Vint.
When the internal circuit 20 enters an active mode such that current consumption rapidly increases, the capacitor C1 supplies an electric charge stored therein so as to stabilize the voltage level. Then, the capacitor C1 receives electric charges corresponding to the supplied electric charges through the internal voltage Vint outputted from the driver 15 and stores the received electric charges. That is, the capacitor C1 performs the voltage stabilization operation by repeating the operation of supplying and receiving electric charges.
At this time, when the capacitor C1 is connected to an output node node_out at all time, the internal voltage Vint outputted from the driver 15 charges the capacitor C1 which is not filled with electric charges, and is then supplied to the internal circuit 20. Since the voltage stabilization ability of the capacitor C1 is proportional to the capacity of the capacitor C1, the circuit may be configured with a capacitor having a large capacity. Thus, when the capacitor C1 has a large capacity, the process of charging the capacitor C1 may degrade the performance of the circuit.